Against Marcion 4.5

In sum: if it is established that what is earlier is truer, that what is from the beginning is earlier, and that what is from the apostles is from the beginning, it will likewise be established that what has been held sacred among the churches of the apostles is what was handed down by the apostles. Let us see what milk the Corinthians drank from Paul; to what rule the Galatians were brought back for correction; what the Philippians, Thessalonians, and Ephesians read; what the Romans too, close at hand, give voice to, to whom both Peter and Paul left the gospel sealed with their own blood as well. We also have the churches nurtured by John. For even if Marcion rejects his Apocalypse, the succession of bishops, traced back to its origin, will rest on John as its founder. So too the pedigree of the other churches is recognized. I say, therefore, that among them, and not only among the apostolic churches but among all those that are joined with them in the fellowship of the sacrament, that gospel of Luke which we are at this moment defending has stood from the beginning of its publication; whereas Marcion's is not even known to most of them, and known to none without being condemned for that very reason. That one too, plainly, has churches, but its own, as late as they are adulterous; and if you look for their lineage, you will more easily find it apostate than apostolic, with Marcion as founder or someone from Marcion's swarm. Wasps make combs too; Marcionites make churches too. The same authority of the apostolic churches will also support the other gospels, which likewise we have through them and in agreement with them: I mean John's and Matthew's, though what Mark published may also be affirmed to be Peter's, whose interpreter Mark was. For people usually ascribe Luke's compilation to Paul as well; and it is proper that what disciples published should be regarded as their masters'. So Marcion must be pressed about these too: why, leaving them aside, he fastened on Luke instead, as if these too had not been in the churches from the beginning, just as Luke's was. Indeed, it is more credible that these were there from the beginning, as being earlier, since apostolic, as dedicated together with the churches themselves. Besides, what sort of thing would it be, if the apostles published nothing, that their disciples should rather have published, who could not even have come to be disciples without some teaching from their masters? So, since it is established that these too were in the churches, why did Marcion not touch these too, either to correct them if adulterated, or to acknowledge them if intact? For it would be fitting that those who were perverting the gospel should rather take care to pervert those whose authority they knew to be more widely received. That is why there were false apostles too: because they imitated the apostles by falsehood. So in so far as he would have corrected what needed correcting, had it been corrupted, to that extent he confirmed that what he did not think needed correcting was not corrupted. In short, he corrected what he judged corrupted; but not even this rightly, because it was not corrupted. For if the apostolic gospels have come down intact, and Luke's, as we have it, agrees so well with their rule that it remains with them in the churches, then it is established that Luke's too came down intact until the sacrilege of Marcion. Indeed, where Marcion laid hands on it, then it became different from and a rival to the apostolic gospels. I will therefore give his disciples some advice: either let them convert those gospels too, however late, to the form of their own … so that it may seem to agree with the apostolic ones (for they are reshaping it daily, as they are daily refuted by us); or let them blush for their master, who is exposed either way, since he now passes over the truth of the gospel knowingly and now overturns it shamelessly. These are more or less the short arguments we use when we are engaged on behalf of the faith of the gospel against heretics, maintaining both the order of time, which rules against the lateness of forgers, and the authority of the churches, which supports the tradition of the apostles; because the truth must precede the falsehood, and proceed from those by whom it was handed down.